Sunday, 31 July 2011

The debt-ceiling deal cuts spending only by the laughable standards of Washington—but that’s still more than has been done before. Obambi has handed his party what is, by their lights, a crap sandwich with a side order of crap. John Podhoretz explains why they must eat it with a big smile:

[I]f House Dems refuse to vote for the deal, they destroy the Obama presidency.

Several shots rang out from a handgun during a large fight near an outdoor concert venue in Cleveland, leaving four people wounded after a “Unity in the Park” festival featuring funk music artist George Clinton, police said Sunday.

A leftist professor and former postal worker argues against the United States Postal Service by arguing for it:

“Here comes Uncle Sam!” is what I used to hear on my mail route in west Durham. Mostly I heard this from older African Americans — along with the usual jokes about bills, junk mail and checks. Almost one-fifth of my customers received Social Security checks, and many of them relied on me to deliver their medications, including on Saturdays. What I didn’t fully appreciate until later was the reassurance they got from seeing their letter carrier and the connection I represented to the Postal Service and the federal government. For them, the post office was also quite likely a place where a relative had found employment — enabling a middle-class lifestyle, homeownership and college tuition for the kids.

The post office has historically helped all kinds of people find jobs, including immigrants, rural migrants and those pursuing higher education. For African Americans in particular, the post office has been a job magnet and a vehicle for social activism and community development. Since changes in the law allowed them to enter the ranks in 1865, African Americans fought segregation and discrimination in the Postal Service and its unions, and they played a key role in modernizing the agency. Historically, the post office has been the largest employer of African Americans, and from 1970 to 2000, blacks were at least twice as likely to work for the post office as whites.

This is a good place for me to drop in my anecdote about immigrant postal workers. I was living in Virginia. One day I discovered my mail box was full of someone else’s mail. Right unit number, wrong street address. I chased down the replacement carrier—a Cambodian by appearances and surname—and discovered the problem likely stemmed from his complete lack of facility in the English language.

In 1950, the post office cut mail delivery from twice to once daily. For the next 20 years, wages stagnated. In 1970, postal workers on average earned $6,100 — an annual salary that was below the national median and that found many postal workers eligible for welfare and food stamps. Low wages provoked a nationwide postal strike that year, in which black employees played a key role. The successful “wildcat” strike — illegal by federal law and unauthorized by the postal unions’ national leadership — compelled a livable wage increase. It also won collective bargaining rights under the 1970 Postal Reorganization Act. That measure also converted the U.S. Post Office into the U.S. Postal Service, an “independent establishment of the executive branch” — in other words, a self-supporting government agency that functions like a corporation.

So the outfit that delivers medication to old folks goes out on strike, and that’s a good thing? Were there any deaths?

The USPS’s current $8 billion deficit is mainly a result of a 2006 congressional directive that the USPS pre-fund all retiree benefits for the next 75 years within 10 years, a financial burden no other agency shares. This imposed deficit has prompted some people to question the need for universal postal service as authorized by the Constitution.

The author interrupts his barrage of statistics about diversity and high wages with a few factoids about the variety of items delivered—but nothing about productivity or efficiency.

Saturday, 30 July 2011

More tiresome bean-counting from the racialists, this time about my governor:

What box should Gov. Nikki Haley check when it comes to her race? The South Carolina Democratic Party tried Thursday to make Haley out as a liar for checking “white” as her race on her 2001 Lexington County voter registration application.

[...]

Shaw, the USC professor, said a person from southern Asia, where India is located, may more often check the box Asian than white. The issue has been the subject of many studies.

Well, you know how I feel about Asian chicks—I may have to vote for her twice next time. (Via InstaPundit.)

The “limited magnitude” of both debt plans put forward by congressional leaders would not put the nation’s AAA credit rating back on solid footing, Moody’s Investors Service announced Friday.

“Reductions of the magnitude now being proposed, if adopted, would likely lead Moody’s to adopt a negative outlook on the AAA rating,” the credit rating agency said in a new report. “The chances of a significant improvement in the long-term credit profile of the government coming from deficit reductions of the magnitude proposed in either plan are not high.”

Cops have busted a group of oddball poachers in Prospect Park — a band of vagrants that was trapping and eating ducks, squirrels and pigeons.

No, oddballs would be trapping them purely for sport.

Parks officers wrote four tickets — two for killing wildlife and two for illegal fishing — totaling $2,100 in fines during a two-day period last week.

The city would not immediately release details of the incidents, which occurred on July 17 and 18 — just days after park-goers told rangers about a “Beverly Hillbillies”-like scene on the southeast side of the lake, near the ice skating rink.

“This is a dodgy group,” said park-goer Peter Colon, who spotted one of the men catching a pigeon while his friend started a fire. “They are the most threatening people in the park.”

Well, with the exception of pervs (mandatory in NYC parks), busybodies, people who use the word “dodgy” without irony, and those whose very names suggests they’re assholes. Colon is guilty on three out of four counts.

The disheveled — and possibly homeless — tribe in question uses “makeshift” fishing poles and traps to catch the critters, then grills them over the fire, according to park watchdogs.

Bums feeding themselves? Not as big a problem as those who don’t. (Via Drudge.)

The revised Boehner bill which squeaked through the House requires passage of a Balanced Budget Amendment if a second raise to the debt ceiling is requested. This is brilliant politics. The Dems are addicted to spending; they will be sorely tempted to ask for it. If they do, the wheels are set in motion to contain big government permanently. Although some states arguably benefit from federal deficit spending, a BBA is popular, and its time has come.

Meanwhile, let Libertyblog connect some dots for you. I noted that all five GOP House members from South Carolina opposed the unrevised Boehner bill. Then they all opposed the revised Boehner bill. Why? Recall the innocuous little mention from Jim DeMint that he wouldn’t be seeking another term. A House member with dreams of moving up to that seat would benefit from the popular DeMint’s endorsement.

Now it’s on to the Senate, where squishy Republicans will no doubt line up to wimp out on their party, and their country. (Via Drudge.)

Friday, 29 July 2011

Last week the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs said Libya was a stalemate and everyone reported it. In the same breath he said we were attriting Qaddafi’s forces and almost no one reported it. Here’s why that’s just as important. (Via InstaPundit.)